When vampire begin to walk in the sunlight and hunt the lesbian of Ottawa, the Catholic Church turns the only one they can: Jesus Christ himself (played by Phil Caracas, who also starred in Harry Knuckles and the Pearl Necklace).
After being recalled to duty by the church, Jesus updates his image with a shave and haircut, pierced ears and a new wardrobe. Then he battle mobs of atheists, lots of vampires, and the mad scientist Dr. Pretorius using his awesome Kung Fu and sidekicks Mary Magnum and El Santos.
El Santos & Jesus Christ
Even though this movie's budget was probably too low for it to be even a B-movie, it's got everything a good B movies should have: a ridiculous premise, fun music numbers, and lots of action. Nevermind the poor film quality, this movie's brilliant.
If you enjoy this you might check out the similar movie, Ultrachrist.
The vatican send Father Wu to the chinese town of Wine-Spring to reopen the Catholic church there. The church had been closed for years ever since it was taken over by an evil that impaled the previous priest with the church's own cross. Opposing the church's re-opening is taoist priest Master Chiou and his two students, Sun and Moon. Chiou strongly disapproves of the Catholic Church's presence in China and views the priest a a corrupting foreign influence (As an interesting side note, many of the rites at the church are in English, rather than Mandarin, like the rest of the movie's dialogue, or Latin.) Chiou, in return, does little to gratiate himself to Father Wu we attends mass in drag and causes a minor scene when discovered.
When the former priest rises from the grave as a vampire (For some reason, when he died, they left his body in a back room with the cross still in his back rather than, you know, burying him.), Master Chiou and Father Wu must overcome their differences to save Wine-Spring from the supernatural threat. Complicating matters is the town's corrupt mayor who, in Scooby Doo fashion, is using his own fake vampires as a cover for his drug smuggling.
This movie movie offers a good mix of horror, action and comedy. If you liked Mr. Vampire of Tsu Hark's Vampire Hunters and didn't mind the production values and want to see more chinese vampire movies, you'll enjoy this movie.
For a long while now I've had a special place in my heart for all of Hammer horror movies, but if pressed I would have to offer this little gem as my favorite.
When Dr Marcus (John Carson), a medical doctor living in a small village notices young girls being drained of their youth, he calls in a old army friend of his, Captain Kronos (Horst Janson). Kronos bears the scars of his time in the army and of a vampire attack, which upon surviving he devoted his life to hunting vampires. Kronos is accompanied by Caroline Munro as the film's obligatory pretty girl and by his hunchback assistant Professor Hieronymus Grost, who acts the brains of the operation to Kronos's brawn.
The movie departs greatly from the formula used in Hammer's Dracula series in a couple of important ways: First, in the universe of Kronos, there are many different types of vampires each with their own specific strengths and weaknesses, and a major (and unintentionally funny) plot point of the movie revolves around the character's attempts to discover how to kill the vampire. Second, Kronos is able to battle the vampire on equal footing and the movies climax is an between Kronos and the vampire, both of them master swordsmen. Today audiences expect that of their vampire hunters, but keep in mind this movie was made in 1974 and Peter Cushing's Van Helsing was representative of the heroes in vampire up to then, and movie audiences expected vampire hunters to battle their foes by waiting for sunup and throwing the curtains open.
This movie stands out as one of Hammer's more creative vampire movies. The director of the movie (Brian Clemens) had wanted to do a series around these characters, but it never came to pass as Hammer was having financial problems by this point. If there is some parallel universe out there somewhere where the director got to film his Kronos series instead of this lone movie, I would give almost anything to be able to visit it long enough to see a Kronos marathon.
